


between every two pines

by anastea



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Hiking AU, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-23
Updated: 2017-09-23
Packaged: 2019-01-04 10:18:42
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,405
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12166953
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anastea/pseuds/anastea
Summary: the john muir trail is a 210.4 mile, three-week trail through california's sierra nevada mountain range. after college graduation, two groups of friends decide separately to hike it. and a couple of those friends, it turns out, don't see eye to eye.





	between every two pines

 “In every walk with nature one receives far more than he seeks.”  
-John Muir

 

**Day 1**

It had been Combeferre’s idea, all of it. He’d been the one to arrange the permits, the lodging at Half Dome, the equipment lists, the parking. And he’d been the one to drag them all, kicking and screaming, from their Portland apartment beds that last morning at Reed. At some ungodly goddamn hour like five, the sun barely risen over Commons.

Enjolras had hated it then. But twelve hours of Courfeyrac’s road trip playlist later they were here, and Enjolras had to admit, with a mug of coffee warming his palms, looking out at the unquestionable majesty of Yosemite Valley – so far it wasn’t half bad. Better than Courfeyrac's road trip playlist.

“ _Arriving by the Panama Steamer,_ ” Combeferre said, materializing next to him as if out of nowhere, “ _I stopped one day in San Francisco and then inquired for the nearest way out of town._ ” He was reading from the faded brown book of John Muir essays Enj was pretty sure he’d straight up stolen from Reed’s library. “ _But where do you want to go?” asked the man to whom I had applied for this important information. “To any place that is wild,” I said._ ”

“Well, you’ve brought us someplace wild.” Enjolras took a sip of his coffee.

Combeferre looked up from the book, round glasses perched on the edge of his nose. “I know you're not crazy about this but I swear to you, it's going to be just what we need before the move to the city. Quality time with Mother Earth.”

“FROM THIS VAAALLLEY THEY SAAAAAY YOU ARE LEAAAAVING.”

Enjolras rolled his eyes. Right on schedule. “Well. Courf’s up.”

“WE SHALL MISS YOUR BRIGHT EYYYYES AND SWEET SMILE.” Courfeyrac joined them at the edge of camp, grinning and bundled in his turquoise sweatshirt. He was already wearing his backpack. Golden morning light tangled in his messy hair.

“Morning, Courfeyrac.” Combeferre looked amused, somehow, and even fond, and not annoyed at all. Maybe Enjolras would’ve felt the same if he’d finished his coffee. “Ready to go?”

“Readier than you two, somehow! Let's fuckin, let's move it, people! We didn’t come all the way down here to stare at trees.”

“Actually that’s exactly what we did,” said Cosette, coming up behind Courf. She was dressed too, smiling and fresh-faced, eternally bright-eyed and cheerful. Enjolras would never understand how she, as a fellow presumably mortal human being, managed to pull that off.

“Alright, but I mean like, let’s go! I trained for this! Gotta put these muscles to work!”

“Okay, alright,” Combeferre sighed. “Enj and I will grab our packs and we’ll go. Give us five.”

“Ten,” Enjolras corrected, finishing the coffee with one last swig. “And we’ll see if you’re so eager after a week of this, Courfeyrac.”

“My spirit cannot be dampened,” Courfeyrac said, and then, to everyone’s dismay, he was singing again. “THEN COME SIIIIIIIT BY MY SIDE IF YOU LOOOOVE ME…”

“Oh lord.” Cosette was laughing. Enj and Ferre turned and headed back for the cabin.

“DO NOT HASTEN TO BID ME ADIEUUUUUU.”

“You know that song’s about North Dakota, right!” Combeferre called back.

“JUST REMEMBER THE RED RIVER VALLEY…”

“Three weeks of this, you signed us up for, Combeferre,” Enjolras said, “Three weeks.”

“AND THE COWWWWBOY THAT’S LOOOOOVED YOUUUU… SOOOOOO TRUUUUUUUE.”

 

**Day 2**

It was early July, and the John Muir Trail – a three week hike from Yosemite Valley to Mount Whitney, through the Sierra Nevada – was packed. They’d been passed often on the first part of the hike, by fellow thru-hikers and by just-for-the-day adventurers headed up Half Dome Mountain. They’d camped at the top and now, on Day 2, up again at 6 AM, it seemed like most of the crowds were behind them.

“I didn’t expect there to be so many people,” Cosette said as they walked, taking a swig from her water bottle. They were going into the valley, descending, and the air was still cool, the sun low and filtered through the pines. An easy start. “I thought this was a bizarre thing to do, honestly, taking a hike this long.”

“It’s a whole world,” Combeferre said, as excited as he had been the day before. Enjolras loved Ferre's enthusiasm, truly, all the time, even before he’d had his coffee in the morning. “People live for this stuff.”

“People almost definitely also die for it.” Courfeyrac was not doing quite so well. So much for the ne’er-dampened spirit. “God, my legs are sore.”

“Don’t worry, Courf.” Enjolras came up behind him and clapped him on the back. “Only ten more miles today.”

“Forgive me, Lord Jesus, for my sins. Carry me away from this place.”

“Oh, come on. I practically live on donuts,” Cosette was laughing. “If I'm doing it, I promise you you can.”

It was two sunny miles, mostly silent, before they came to a stream where Combeferre proposed they fill up on water. Enjolras wasn't used to so much quiet, the only sounds their footsteps, the wind in the trees. It was a nice change, not to have to talk so much. They sat by the stream. Courf collapsed on the bank and peeled off his shoes.

“ _No other mountain chain on this or any other of the continents that I have seen,_ ” read Combeferre – did he keep that book in his fanny pack? – “ _is so rich as the Sierra in bold, striking, well-preserved glacial monuments. Indeed, every feature is more or less tellingly glacial. Not a peak, ridge, dome, canyon, yosemite, lake-basin, stream or forest will you see that does not in some way explain the past existence and modes of action of flowing, grinding, sculpturing, soil-making, scenery-making ice._ ”

“Fascinating,” said Cosette, like she meant it, which she probably did. She had pulled out a little notebook and was drawing the flowers that bloomed in bursts of delicate yellow by the streambed.

“Those are called California coneflower,” Combeferre noted, snacking on trail mix. “Rudbeckia californica.”

Enjolras busied himself with unpeeling the purification tablets from their packaging, filling up his water bottle from the stream and popping them in. Fresh air filled his lungs and he felt small amongst the tall emerald pines. Bald grey rock rose above even these, making him smaller still, making him mortal, making him insignificant.

Combeferre had been right – this had been what he needed, before the move to Seattle. A chance to drop out of the fight, just for these three weeks, to take care of himself, to remember what he was fighting for: this, the Earth, and the people who made their home here. Under the azure sky and the golden July sun.

“Hikers ho,” said Courf, looking back towards the way they came. Enjolras squinted in the sunlight and saw them – a group of four or five, approaching the stream from behind. Shadows, blurry against their background.

“Well, we couldn’t have expected to go too long without seeing anyone.” Cosette flipped her notebook closed and went to where she’d dropped her pack. “Pass me one of those tablets, will you, E?”

He did, and the tablets went round and Courfeyrac put his shoes back on again and by the time they were ready to go, the group of hikers was coming up close behind them.

“Should we wait here another minute and let them pass?” Cosette was asking, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear, when:

“Courfeyrac?” It was a voice from the group behind. They stopped, looking at each other with furrowed brows and half-shrugs, and they all squinted against the sunlight to see what they could make out.

“Oh, holy shit.” Courfeyrac lit up like a candle, dimples aligning as his mouth widened into that familiar, joyful grin. “Holy shit, it’s Bossuet.”

“Who?” Cosette put her sunglasses on, and oh, yeah, that was a thought. Enjolras did the same and the approaching party came into focus.

Leading the charge was a tall, bald black boy, wearing a smile like Courfeyrac’s, and behind him: a shorter fellow with a serious look on his face, a smiling girl, a scowling girl, and a slouchy-looking guy with his hair in a messy topknot. Assuming he’d correctly discerned their actual genders from their gender presentation, which, of course, who knew.

“Courfeyrac, you son of a _bitch_ , I told you so many times freshman year I wanted to do this trail and now you do it without even telling me?” The boy in front was wrapping Courfeyrac in as un-awkward a hug as was possible with these giant packs on their backs.

“Fuck! I one hundred percent forgot, I swear, Bossuet, you know I would’ve called. But isn't this great?” Courfeyrac was almost bouncing on the balls of his feet. “Everyone, this is Bossuet! He was one of the only friends I made at UW before I transferred to Reed. Bossuet, these are my Reed friends, Enjolras, Combeferre, and Cosette.”

“Great to meet y’all!”

Oh, Enjolras thought he had heard something about Bossuet before, yeah, he’d been in the Black Lives Matter club Courf had said he’d joined back at UW.

“Well, introduce the rest of us, please,” said the smiling girl, still smiling, light brown cheeks flushed, dark hair piled up on her head.

“Ah, oh, yes, I’m sorry,” Bossuet said, “This is my girlfriend Musichetta, my boyfriend Joly, and our friends Eponine and Grantaire.”

Joly, the serious-faced one, smiled now too and gave a full wave. Grantaire, the topknot guy, did a little half one. He was looking at Enjolras, for some reason, and wouldn’t stop even though Enjolras was looking back, and – oh, he couldn’t tell, obviously, Enjolras was wearing his sunglasses. He took them off and looked this Grantaire guy in the eye and so he finally looked away, gaze sliding off like oil on water.

“My best friend just graduated from Reed,” Eponine was saying. She was dressed all in black, a serious feat on a day due to be as hot as this one. “Maybe you know him? Marius Pontmercy?”

Courfeyrac and Combeferre burst into laughter, and Enjolras cracked a smile. Cosette was beaming from ear to ear. “Sorry about them. They’re laughing because we know him very, very well. He’s my boyfriend.”

“Oh!” Was Enjolras imagining things, or did her smile fade a touch? “Oh, great.”

“What a crazy small world,” Courf laughed. “Good ole Bossuet on the trail, folks who know our Marius – look, we’ve got to hike this thing together, right?”

Enjolras balked internally and tried not to let it show on his face. He wasn’t so good at that. He tried but he knew he was probably scowling as externally as ever, and Combeferre was shooting him a look, so yeah, definitely scowling.

Whatever. Too damn bad. What gave Courfeyrac the right to decide that, on his own, without consulting the group? He didn’t want to spend the next three weeks socializing with people he barely knew. He wanted fresh air, sun, peace and quiet.

“I’m game,” said Grantaire, and he was looking at Enjolras again, dammit, why? Enjolras pointedly stared and he glanced away.

“Me too,” said Cosette, smiling. “I’ve actually heard a lot about you from Marius, Eponine. We should be friends.”

“We should all be friends!” Courf hadn’t been this excited in twenty-four hours, which Enjolras supposed he should be supportive of. Maybe it wouldn’t be horrible. Courfeyrac liked this Bossuet, and Enjolras trusted Courfeyrac, trusted him with his life. And if these people were Bossuet’s friends they were probably friendly, and smart, and more than appropriately political.

Besides – they were from Seattle. Maybe he could start building his next activist network, right now, in California.

This is meant to be a vacation from that, a voice said in the back of his mind.

Said another voice: yeah, but…

The fighter in him won. “If you can tolerate Courfeyrac singing, and Combeferre spouting off the name of every plant along the road, and me being a total ass before I’ve fully woken up in the morning,” he said, smiling at the looks on his friends’ faces, “Then we would absolutely love for you to join us.”

\--

They huddled around one fire that night, all nine of them, pressed in close to share the warmth. Light flickered on their faces, tingeing them all in an orange hue.

“ _You will find it a magnificent sky camp,_ ” Combeferre was reading, glasses glinting in the firelight. “ _Clumps of dwarf pine and mountain hemlock will furnish resin roots and branches for fuel and light, and the rills, sparkling water. Thousands of the little plant people will gaze at your camp-fire with the crystals and stars, companions and guardians as you lie at rest in the heart of the vast serene night._ ”

Musichetta tipped her head to rest it on Joly’s shoulder. “You know,” she said, voice bright over the crackling fire, “I know I barely know you guys yet, but. I think we’re going to be very good friends.”

The stars winked, in agreement, maybe, the milky way in full color overhead.

 

**Day 3**

“So now we’re going into Cathedral Pass.” Combeferre’s face was buried in his map. “We should take a break when we get to Cathedral Lake, where there are some nice views, and then down to Tuolomne Meadow where there’s a campground. We can catch a shuttle to the store and restock.”

“Thank god,” Cosette said, “We’re nearly out of coffee.”

“Don’t say that in front of Enjolras.”

At Cathedral Lake, they spread out their blankets on some bare grey rocks and piled all their snacks to share – trail mix, various different kinds of protein bars, some fruit. This was lunch. Hot breakfast in the mornings, hot dinners at night, dry snacks all the way through the day – minimal prep and less to carry.

Enjolras was already getting used to it, his body adjusting to this new way of life. There was soreness, starting, in his legs, but that was to be expected. Within a week he knew he’d be feeling better. Live the pain, love the pain, and all that, or. Whatever.

He found himself sitting next to Bossuet, Musichetta, and Grantaire. What better time to get to work?

“So from what Courfeyrac has told me, you were involved with some activist groups in Seattle?” The peanut butter protein bar tasted like heaven.

“Oh yeah,” Bossuet replied. “All of us are. Well, except Grantaire.”

“Hey,” Grantaire said, leaning back on his hands and sporting a loose, easy grin. “I go to them.”

“I don’t know if just showing up counts as being involved.”

“To be fair he sure does talk,” Musichetta said with a fond roll of her eyes and a noisy bite into an apple.

“I do!” Grantaire said. “I’m involved. I say things. I put in my two cents.”

“You put in one hundred more cents than anyone literally ever asked for,” Bossuet laughed, and turned again to Enjolras: “Grantaire is the biggest goddamned nihilist you will ever meet. Not to mention a libertarian.”

There was a fucking libertarian in this group? Enjolras immediately regretted trusting Courfeyrac, and trusting Bossuet, and trusting the universe, and everything he’d ever done that had led him to this moment. Three weeks with a libertarian. He should just walk back to the trailhead now.

“Oh?” He internally congratulated himself on how cool and collected he sounded. Way to go. A breeze swept across the rocks, playing with the ends of his hair, cooling the sweat on the back of his neck.

“Nihilist before libertarian,” Grantaire chimed in. “Being libertarian essentially means nothing, since nothing means anything, y’know. But. On those rare moments when I can be convinced to care about government, I’m generally anti-government.”

Enjolras controlled his breathing. Just like your therapist taught you, Enjolras, he told himself, just keep your fucking head on straight and get through this conversation like a civil human being.

“That’s interesting,” he said, and oh good god, his voice was several pitches too high. “That’s very interesting,” he said, and now he’d overcompensated, and it was too low. All three of them were giving him looks. He cleared his throat. “Um. May I ask why you go to activist group meetings, if, um, you don’t believe in activism?”

“Their group’s meeting happens at my favorite bar,” Grantaire said, smile easing its way back across his face, and Bossuet laughed, and Musichetta punched him affectionately on the shoulder. Enjolras would really love to know what the hell was so amusing.

“He has his moments,” Musichetta said to Enj, as if to reassure him. “He cares more than he says he does.”

“I like to take people at face value,” Enjolras said. Terse and sharp.

Oh. That was harsh. Bossuet’s laughter faded, and even Musichetta frowned.

“Marxist, I assume?” Grantaire asked, voice cold.

“Democratic socialist.”

“Any time you think you can handle real debate, you know where to find me.”

“Hey!” Courfeyrac jumped in from a separate conversation, talking with his mouth full. “No debates. No politics in the beautiful wilderness.”

Enjolras frowned. “Without politics, this beautiful wilderness wouldn’t be here to enjoy. Everything is politics.”

“Only when you paint the world with a human brush,” Grantaire said, and pointed. Not more than thirty feet away was a group of mule deer, dipping graceful noses into the lake, sending ripples across the surface. Enjolras was struck all at once by the way the clear plate of water reflected the sky, by a hawk swooping overhead. By the power of the jagged mountains, cutting stone into cloudless blue.

“Oh man, where’s my camera.” Courfeyrac rummaged around in the top compartment of his pack.

“ _Nothing in the affairs of men is worthy of great anxiety,_ ” Grantaire said, head on his knees, looking at Enjolras.

“Plato?” Enjolras asked, frowning.

“Mhm. Classics major.”

“Ah.” Enjolras stretched out his legs on the blanket, looked up at Cathedral Peak. “Well. I think making sure people have the ability and the freedom to witness all this beauty is worthy of at least a little anxiety.”

“Maybe,” Grantaire said, and his voice was soft.

“ _The world, we are told,_ ” Combeferre chipped in from across the rock, apparently quoting this Muir from memory, “ _was made especially for man – a presumption not supported by all the facts._ ”

Grantaire turned to Enjolras with another obnoxious grin. “Or maybe not.”

 

**Day 5**

The colors of sunrise, here, were what Enjolras had thought only appeared in paintings and on computer screens, human-born through the mixing of pigments and pixels. But they were real. Bright pinks and shifting crystalline blues, thin, subtle oranges, rising yellow. They dappled the mountains, seeped like spilled ink across the clouds.

“I wish I had a canvas,” Grantaire murmured.

Enjolras could understand how people believed in God, could understand, strangely, what Grantaire meant. His longing to recreate it. It felt, for a moment, like some artist must have made this and left it here for them to find. A challenge: to use their lives to try to create something, something that could maybe come close to being this beautiful.

“ _This grand show is eternal,_ ” Combeferre read quietly. “ _It is always sunrise somewhere; the dew is never all dried at once; a shower is forever falling; vapor is ever rising. Eternal sunrise, eternal sunset, eternal dawn and gloaming, on sea and continents and islands, each in its turn, as the round earth rolls._ ”

 

**Day 7**

On day seven it rained, loud, rolling rain like stampeding horses. Thunder cracked over the mountaintops. They were hiking up into Donahue Pass, and it didn’t feel safe, ascending in this weather, but it wasn’t like there was anywhere to stop.

“I HEAR THIS PART OF THE TRAIL IS USUALLY PRETTY DUSTY,” Combeferre yelled over the roar. “AT LEAST WE’RE MISSING OUT ON THAT.”

“OH YES,” Joly called back. “WE ARE EXTREMELY FORTUNATE.”

“IT’S MY FAULT,” Bossuet said, “I’M CURSED, I HAVE TERRIBLE LUCK.”

“NO WORRIES, MAN,” this was Eponine, “WE LOVE IT, WE LOVE THE RAIN.”

“ _WHAT A PSALM THE STORM WAS SINGING_ ,” Combeferre said. “ _AND HOW FRESH THE SMELL OF THE WASHED EARTH AND LEAVES, AND HOW SWEET THE STILL SMALL VOICES OF THE STORM!_ ”

Grantaire, who was just a little ways behind Enjolras, burst into laughter. Enjolras glanced back at him and caught an image of his face in the dim storm-light: soaked, windswept hair, curled strands plastered to his forehead, wide smile, something wild in his grey-green eyes, joy of adventure singing in the way his chin angled up towards the clouds.

It really is too bad he’s a libertarian, Enjolras thought to himself; he’s not unattractive. Even somewhat handsome. Not conventionally, really, but. There was something about his face, something about his jawline, maybe, or the way you could always tell he was thinking.

When the storm cleared, they had reached the top of Island Pass and were looking at Banner Peak rising over a rain-grey lake. The top of it buried in purple clouds. Grantaire shook out his long hair, splattering Cosette and Musichetta in raindrops, and they jumped away shrieking, laughing. Courfeyrac slung a damp arm over Enjolras’ shoulder, and they stood in silent gratitude for the respite.

 

**Day 9**

“Grantaire,” Musichetta announced when they were comfortably seated at Mammoth Lodge, “Has gone ten days without a drop of alcohol, and for that, I think he deserves a reward.”

She produced from a plastic bag nine individual bottles of lemonade, purchased at the little lodge shop where they’d restocked what they could. Combeferre’s lighter had broken, so they’d snatched a new one, and they were in dour need of protein bars and trail mix, and some of Enjolras’ socks sported holes from where he’d walked right through em.

Courfeyrac gasped and clutched the lemonade to his chest. “I didn’t see this at the store! Thank you, Musichetta. Thank you for everything.” Small wonders, Enjolras smiled to himself, savoring that first sip. He hadn’t missed luxuries, really, but. God this lemonade was good.

Oh, wait. What had Musichetta said?

“I tried to tell her I am not actually an alcoholic,” Grantaire said, pulling an affectionate face in Musichetta’s direction, “And hopefully this proves it to her, but regardless, it is something of an accomplishment, so, thanks Chetta, and thank the good lord Jesus for Minute Maid.”

Ah, so Grantaire had a drinking problem. The nihilist, huh, wow, who would’ve guessed.

Courfeyrac: “Hear, hear.” More statements like that, more chatter, a debate about the superiority of Newman’s Own.

Enjolras zoned out, and he didn’t realize he was looking at Grantaire until Grantaire looked at him, a sliding-over kind of look, an is-he-looking-at-me-because-he-just-found-out-I-have-an-alcohol-problem kind of look. Maybe? He probably projected that. Enjolras had never been that good at interpreting facial expressions.

“It’s really not that big of a problem,” Grantaire said over Joly, who sat between them, and who anyway was leaning forward a lot and very engaged in this lemonade debate. “I do drink not, um, infrequently, but. I’m not itching or anything. People tend to think it’s worse than it is. I just like a drink.”

“So you just drink because you like the taste of alcohol, not because you’re trying to forget the meaninglessness of your existence.”

“Right.” Grantaire was grinning. “Never have I ever done that.”

“Good. Because that would not be healthy.” And then his voice surprised himself and said something for which his brain had given him no warning: “Good job going those ten days, though. It takes strength to fix an unhealthy habit. I admire the dedication.”

Grantaire’s eyebrows raised slightly, in shock. “Thanks.” His face softened. “You know, it hasn’t been difficult at all. Maybe my existence hasn’t felt so meaningless these days.”

“The beauty of nature healing your wounded spirit?”

“Among other things,” Grantaire said, soft smile, soft eyes. Enjolras looked away quickly, and maybe it was the sugar from the lemonade. Too much sweetness all at once. Something fluttered in his chest.

 

**Day 10**

“This whole area is volcanic,” Combeferre informed them as they passed through short woods, baby fir trees, shrubs dotting the landscape. “This stone is all pumice. Formed when lava solidifies very quickly.”

“I don’t think I’ll ever hike without an ecologist again,” Joly piped up from the back, and there was some smattered applause for that. Combeferre laughed.

“Any Muir for us today, Ferre?”

“Hm.” Combeferre whipped out his book – it was in his fanny pack, curled up to fit – and flipped through the pages as he walked. “How about this. _The snow on the high mountains is melting fast, and the streams are singing bank-full, swaying softly through the level meadows and bogs, quivering with sun-spangles, swirling in pot-holes, resting in deep pools, leaping, shouting in wild, exulting energy over rough boulder dams, joyful, beautiful in all their forms. No Sierra landscape that I have seen holds anything truly dead or dull, or any trace of what in manufactories is called rubbish or waste; everything is perfectly clean and pure and full of divine lessons._ ”

“Beautiful.”

“What about the tendency of patriarchy to associate the Earth simultaneously with femininity and purity, and femininity and purity with each other?” Cosette said thoughtfully, stepping over stones in their path.

“Yes, sister,” Musichetta said, snapping.

“Also linked to the rhetorical necessity to ‘preserve,’” Eponine added, “As in, preserving the Earth, preserving female virginity, etc.”

“You can’t possibly be arguing that preserving the Earth is a bad thing,” Bossuet said.

“No, just that male-centric and male-sponsored preservation doesn’t always have the best of motivations, and those motivations ought to be critiqued,” said Cosette.

And on and on like this, and Enjolras was happy, and his soul was light. They spotted a bald eagle later that day, soaring down into the valley, buoyed by currents.

 

**Day 11**

“ _Ever since the establishment of the Yosemite National Park, strife has been going on around its borders and I suppose this will go on as part of the universal battle between right and wrong, however much of its boundaries may be shorn, or its wild beauty destroyed._ ”

“That’s a depressing one to start the day with, Combeferre.”

They were packing up their camp around Lake Virginia, where ripples spread out across deep blue, where the reflections of pines and mountains on the other edge danced on the water. Enjolras knocked chunks of dirt off of his boots as best he could, rubbing the sleep from his eyes. The shifting sounds of plastic as the tents were curled up, the cool, breezy air of morning. He yawned. He drank his coffee, hot in its tin mug.

Combeferre pulled his sweater over his head, tied it around his waist. “I just want us to continue to be mindful of the reality of this place,” he said, “Its potential transience in a shifting political world.”

“I just don’t believe that,” Grantaire said. He too had a mug of coffee in his hands, his dark hair matted in the back by sleep. He wore a thick tan cardigan. Enjolras resisted the urge to refer to him mentally as adorable. “No matter what we do to it, the Earth is going to repair itself. I’m not saying we should use that as an excuse to destroy the Earth or anything, like ruin it for profit alone. I think we should use the Earth well and private property owners should be required to be responsible stewards of their land. But in the end, I mean, in the bigger picture, even if we do destroy the Earth, the planet will just kick us out and start over again without us. We’re so insignificant.”

“You do see, though, how easily that argument could be used to prop up the ideas of those who do just want to ruin the Earth for profit,” Courfeyrac said. Enjolras sipped his coffee, glad someone else had said it. He was feeling calm this morning, and comfortable, and he wanted to look at mountains today. What he did not want was to get into a pointless, circular debate with a nihilist.

“I also don’t think we can trust private property owners to be responsible stewards,” said Bossuet.

“Speaking as an Indigenous person,” Musichetta said, “I think that’s insulting, and I absolutely do think we can trust private owners to take care of their land. My tribe has ownership of our sacred land and we take care of it well. Others can too.”

“Not every culture has your respect for the natural world.”

“You said required,” Enjolras said suddenly, and dammit, here he went again, what happened to looking at the mountains, what happened to calm and comfortable? Shit. “You said property owners should be required to be responsible stewards. Who’s going to require that, if not the government?”

“Culture,” Grantaire said, “We need to shift our culture so that it values the environment, not change our government to impose a rules on people whose culture tells them to do otherwise.”

Enjolras finished his coffee. Wiped his mouth with his sleeve. He was about to go full Enjolras on this guy, and shut him up once and for all, and then, god dammit, he was gonna look at those goddamned mountains.

“How do you think we’re supposed to change the culture without changing the structure of the society in which we live?” He said. “Our government, and the rules that spring from it, are products of the culture, yes, but they also generate the culture. Everything is connected. We can’t change the way people think when the government and its rules are validating the lazy ways they already do think. If the government says it’s okay to abuse the environment, if the authority tells you that, who, with profit in mind, would make a different choice? What is culture but collective choice of what to value? If we change the laws, if we make clear to people what we, as a nation, value, and if we give them full and equal justice under our governmental system, then the culture will shift. When it realizes that those cultural values work in their day-to-day lives.”

“And you think,” good god in heaven, this guy just wouldn’t give up! “That by telling people they can no longer do something, that will convince them that preservation is important. They’ll just suddenly start to believe that.”

“No!” It was like he was willfully misunderstanding. Enjolras felt that familiar feeling in his gut, that frustrated, angry feeling. “I’m saying that if we say they can’t ruin the environment, and then change the system so that it is more profitable not to ruin the environment than to ruin it, _that_ will convince people that protecting the environment is useful.”

“I just disagree so completely. It has to happen from the ground up, not the top down. We need to stop imposing government rules and start letting the bad people do what they want. Then change can start to happen locally, when people start realizing that unless they do something in their individual communities, unless they shift their cultural values, they’re going to fuck themselves.”

“Excuse me, we should just ‘let the bad people do what they want’? That’s just so absurd I don’t even know how to respond to it.”

“Great way to end a debate there, E.”

“Do _not_ call me that.” Enjolras had forgotten where they were, forgotten their surroundings, forgotten that seven other people were watching this, dumbstruck. The world had narrowed to Grantaire, his face, his voice, his stupid, dangerous ideas. “You’re assuming that people have the-”

“Okay.” Combeferre had risen from his seat by the lakeside, had approached without Enj knowing. He took Enjolras by the arm, now, gently, and applied the slightest pressure. “This debate’s over now. We’re packing up, and we’re hiking, okay. We’re doing what we came here to do. We’re leaving work behind. Sound good?”

Enjolras wrenched his arm away, heart beating fast. “Fine,” he hissed in Grantaire’s direction. He looked like a fierce, angry thing, Grantaire did, but there was something else in his face, playing around the corners of his mouth, the creases around his eyes, something amused. Something getting satisfaction out of this. Enjolras hated him, hated him in his bones.

 

**Day 12**

They fought. 

**Day 13**

They fought.

“This is getting to be really disruptive,” Combeferre said, pulling him aside. “It needs to stop, please, on behalf of everyone here, I’m begging you. Do you think you can do that for us?”

“I’ll try.”

**Day 14**

They fought.

**Day 15**

They woke, and everyone else was gone.

For Enjolras, who hadn’t yet had his coffee, this was an almost unimaginable disaster. He considered returning to his tent, crawling back into his sleeping bag, and slowly dying there.

He took a deep breath, said nothing to Grantaire, and pulled the stove out of his bag.

He had the stove. He had his own rations. He had his sleeping bag, they’d left him his tent, which he’d been sharing with Courf – Courf was terrible at sneaking, how had Courf snuck out? He had a map, Combeferre had made sure they all had one, and he had a compass. All his clothes. And by the remains of the fire, it looked like someone – Ferre, no doubt – had left behind a lighter and a small faded brown paperback book.

It was the essays, and there was a note: “We’ve gone ahead. You need to work this out alone. Keep this, for wisdom. We’ll see you soon. Much love.”

He couldn’t work through the sting of this betrayal, not this early in the morning, not without caffeine.

Grantaire coughed quietly. “Ah. I made some coffee earlier.” He approached Enjolras slowly, like he was trying to get close to a lion without waking it. This irritated Enjolras even more, somehow. He handed him a tin mug, still warm. Without comment, Enjolras took a sip.

God, that was good. Sweet mercy. The sky was heavy and grey, Evolution Lake shining turquoise through the fog. The terrain was rocky, all around, rocky and colorless. Swelling silence.

He drank quietly, contemplating his fate. Two weeks back to the trailhead – not an option, going back. He could leave the trail at some other exit point, find a town on the map, make his way there, hop on a bus to the trail’s end. Pay for a hotel room until the rest of them showed up. That seemed like the best option. Cut this short as best he could.

This is almost abusive of them, Enjolras thought to himself, leaving us here together like this when they know we don’t get along. He was going to have to have a serious conversation with his friends.

“I think it’s best if we talk as little as possible,” Enjolras said finally. His voice sounded flat in the moisture-laden air. “Let’s just stick to getting out of this mess.”

“Sounds great.” Grantaire’s voice was flat, too, emotionless. Their words hung in the impenetrable fog. They packed in silence, started off in silence. Enjolras saw Grantaire take the John Muir book and tuck it into the side pocket of his pack.

\--

They fought.

“Okay, look, stop, stop!” Grantaire actually, physically stopped in his tracks. “Look, they obviously left us behind because we can’t stop doing this. We need to figure out how to communicate with each other here.”

“No, actually, we don’t.” Enjolras had had enough. He was tired, and he was sick of oatmeal and trail mix, and without his friends he didn’t know if he could do this. He didn’t know if he wanted to do this. “We really don’t, Grantaire, because believe me, I do not intend for you to be in my life after this. I hope to god when we get out of here I never see you again.”

“So then what’s the point of arguing with me at all?”

“Excuse me?”

“We keep arguing,” Grantaire said, “About politics. About our different ideas, and then we argue about how we present those ideas, and about every little vocab slip-up and miscommunication and-”

“Get to the point.”

“So if we’re arguing about things like that – I mean, what’s the point of putting in all that effort if you’re never going to reap any reward?”

“Reward?”

“I mean – aren’t you putting in the effort because you want to change my mind?”

Enjolras hadn’t thought of it like this. Remained unconvinced that he needed to think of it like this. “I don’t know, to be honest with you, why I’m putting in the effort.”

“Arguing is fucking exhausting,” Grantaire said, and it came out as half a laugh. He was wearing a mustard yellow shirt, and it was the brightest thing in the fog. “At least for me, and I can’t imagine it isn’t for you. So it’s just surprising to hear you say you want me out of your life. If you really didn’t care, you wouldn’t be trying to convince me of anything. So you do care, for some reason. What I think.”

“I don’t. I really don’t.”

“You can see, though, can’t you, how all evidence is to the contrary.”

Enjolras buried his face in his hands, ran his hands up through his hair. Grantaire was right about one thing at least, and that was that this? Was exhausting. “Alright, you can just – you can just fucking have this one, okay? Jesus. You win. I care about changing your mind.”

“Why?”

Enjolras, truly, had no idea why. “Because you’re friends with my friends,” he said reluctantly. “Because I’m moving to Seattle and I want to join Bossuet’s activist group, and you’re a part of that, and they seem to – they seem to like you for some reason, and I just don’t get it. Frankly I don’t even know how they tolerate you.”

“Wow.”

“And I want to understand why they like you so much, because honestly, I can’t.”

“Wow. Great. Excellent. Maybe you were right, up top, when you said we just shouldn’t talk at all.”

“You really think I was right about something? God, I am so flattered.”

Grantaire started walking again, blazing past Enjolras over rocks, over dirt. “I wish I had a drink,” he muttered to himself as he passed.

Enjolras rolled his eyes to the high heavens.

 

**Day 16**

“ _Water rivers work openly where people dwell, and so does the rain, and the sea, thundering on all the shores of the world; and the universal ocean of air, though invisible, speaks aloud in a thousand voices, and explains its modes of working and its power. But glaciers, back in their white solitudes, work apart from men, exerting their tremendous energies in silence and darkness. Outspread, spirit-like, they brood above the predestined landscapes-_ "

“I don’t think this is relevant to the terrain.”

“Eat my ass.”

They were passing through Grouse Meadow, and now greenery spilled out all around. Mountains fenced them in on either side. Earlier in this trip Enjolras might’ve felt humbled by them, in awe, maybe, reverent. Now all he could feel was trapped, wherever he looked. No matter the beauty.

“I can’t walk in total silence here,” Grantaire said. “Not for this many hours. I’m going insane.”

Enjolras sighed. “Okay, let’s talk about this. We’re in a deep valley, which means the sun is going to set pretty early. The best way forward ahead of us is Mather Pass, but that means an 11 mile ascent. We haven’t walked that far today but I’m already tired. So let’s just. Stop early, set up camp here, and deal with the ascent tomorrow. How does that sound.”

“Phenomenal.” Grantaire dropped his pack. “I’ll go gather some kindling, if you wanna pick a site.”

Glad to be rid of you, Enjolras thought. He dropped his pack, too, dug his fingers into his knotted shoulders, letting his head hang down. He breathed in slowly, breathed out slower. Trying to release tension. He was alone in this valley, he was alone in the mountains. In that restful moment he could almost believe it.

How exactly had he gotten stuck here? How was he going to get out? Reluctantly, he acknowledged that yes, Combeferre had taken him aside, had asked him to stop the fighting with Grantaire, and he hadn't - couldn't, for whatever reason, let anything Grantaire said go. Alright, well, maybe, in some small way, it was his fault. But still. They shouldn't have abandoned him.

He breathed, keeping his breath even. He looked down at his feet, his worn boots, the dirt beneath them. Maybe he could try. Maybe he could finish what they set out to do, get to the end of this. Maybe they could even catch up with the group. It was quiet out here, too quiet, stretching, expansive quiet, and Enjolras' thoughts circled like vultures.

“Was pretty easy to find stuff, here." A soft clattering as sticks fell. "Have you even looked around since-“

Grantaire stopped mid-sentence. The silence took over again, swallowing Grantaire's voice. Enjolras, frowning, looked up.

No more than twenty feet away was a black bear.

“Holy motherfucking shit,” Enjolras whispered. The bear was looking right at him. He heard and felt Grantaire, about a foot behind him, nervously shifting his weight. He couldn't tear his eyes from the bear. “Oh my god. Grantaire. Grantaire, what the hell do we do. It’s a fucking bear, Grantaire. Oh my god.”

“I know it’s a bear, Enjolras, I can see, I know it’s a goddamned motherfucking bear.” He sounded frantic, too.

“Do we back away slowly? Holy shit.”

“Yeah, that’s the right thing to do. Back away very slowly. Keep your eyes on it.”

Enjolras took a few slow steps backwards. The bear didn’t move, just sat there, blinking. It wasn’t large, not a grizzly, thank god. But it wasn’t a baby and it looked nothing like bears in cartoons. Cartoons had blatantly lied to him.

Enjolras felt himself starting to sweat. His life was flashing before his eyes. What had he done? He hadn’t accomplished anything yet. He couldn’t die like this, out here in the middle of nowhere.

“I’ve got bear deterrent in my pack-”

“What is that?” Enjolras’ voice sounded strange to his own ears, far away and shaking. “Some kind of, like, some kind of weapon?”

“What? No, for god’s sake. It’s a spray. But my pack’s in front of us and we’re back here.”

“So how is that useful?”

“We can’t survive out here without our packs, is really what I’m saying, so we have to get back to them.”

“I say abandon now, come back later.” Enjolras considered himself a brave person, by any normal standards. He'd stood down cops with tear gas, he'd do it again in an instant. This was different. This was not a normal situation. He was definitely sweating now.

“No. I have another idea. I think I read about this. It’s a black bear, right, not a grizzly or anything?”

“You _think_ you read about this? I really don’t like that, Grantaire.”

“Is it a fucking black bear or isn’t it, Enjolras?”

“Yes, yes, I think so.” Enjolras could radiate out of his body, he was shaking so much.

“Okay. Good.” Grantaire moved up. He moved up! He moved up in front of Enjolras, towards the bear!

“What in god’s fucking name are you doing, Grantaire, please do not get us killed, please, I am too young to die like this.” All this in hushed whispers, that last in a half-sob.

“Trust me.”

Enjolras was fairly sure this was it for him.

Grantaire stood up tall, feet firmly planted. His shoulders, Enjolras noticed, were broad, and Enj saw for the first time that he had a tattoo, floral, winding up the back of his neck. Enjolras had nothing to do with that information. Wouldn’t matter in two minutes anyway, since they’d be dead.

Grantaire sucked in a breath. And then he said, voice pitched low and booming across the valley: “Get out of here, bear!”

Maybe it was the nerves. Maybe it was the sheer improbability of this entire situation. Maybe it was for no reason at all. Enjolras burst into (quiet) laughter.

“Shut the fuck up!” Grantaire hissed, but Enjolras couldn’t, he couldn’t stop. “Get out of here, bear!” Grantaire said again in that deep, commanding voice, and Enjolras doubled over.

“Oh my god, Grantaire,” he wheezed, barely able to see through half-closed eyes, wet with laughter tears, but with enough visibility to see: “It’s working. It’s working, Grantaire, oh my god.”

The bear was backing away. The bear was turning.

“Of course it’s working,” Grantaire whispered furiously. “I told you, I read about this.”

The bear scampered off, back behind some trees and around the edge of an outcropping.

Enjolras’ knees gave way and he dropped like a stone. Grantaire went immediately to his pack and pulled out a canister of what was, ostensibly, bear deterrent. He clutched it like a lifeline.

“We almost died,” Enjolras breathed into his hands.

Grantaire was laughing now, maybe from relief. “I don’t think I’d go that far,” he said, “But uh. Yeah. That was. Unexpectedly frightening.”

“Understatement of the year.” Enjolras looked up. Grantaire was grinning down at him, shaking a little bit, too, and in that moment Enjolras honestly could’ve kissed him for saving their lives. “Let’s camp somewhere else?” He said, voice thin.

“Yes, _please_.” 

 --

“ _Bears,_ ” Grantaire read as they sat by their fire, “ _are made of the same dust as we, and they breathe the same winds and drink of the same waters. A bear’s days are warmed by the same sun, his dwellings are overdomed by the same blue sky, and his life turns and ebbs with heart pulsing like ours. He was poured from the same first fountain. And whether he at last goes to our stingy Heaven or not, he has terrestrial immortality. His life, not long, not short, knows no beginning, no ending. To him life unstinted, unplanned, is above the accidents of time, and his years, markless and boundless, equal eternity._ ”

“Now that,” Enjolras said around a mouthful of dinner, “Is what I call relevant to the terrain.”

\--

In his tent later that night every sound was an echo, every breath of wind a creature coming through the night. He’d never been cowardly, but. He couldn’t sleep. His pulse was racing and his thoughts were a swarm: the things he had to do, the things he’d done, the things he might not live to accomplish.

Feeling pitiful, feeling alone, he unzipped the tent flap and crawled into the cool night.

“Grantaire?” He murmured at the door to Grantaire’s tent. He was too afraid to really hate himself for this, not yet, though he knew he would in the morning. Today, he told himself, it didn’t matter. They had a long climb tomorrow, and if he didn’t sleep-

“Enjolras?” A rustling, a zipping. Enjolras would barely be able to see in the unpolluted darkness, if not for the silvery moon. It cast a dull sheen on the tents, the remains of the fire, the outlines of trees. Grantaire’s face as it appeared in the opening. “You okay?”

“I’m, ah.” He couldn’t look Grantaire in the eye. “Um. I’m having trouble sleeping. Any chance we can – I’d just feel safer if I got my sleeping bag and, ah.”

“You want to – you want to sleep with me? I mean.” Grantaire made a face. “Ah. In here, I mean. Obviously.”

“If that’s not incredibly weird, then. Yeah.”

“Not weird at all. We had a near-death encounter today. All unusual behavior completely excused, and I am fully aware that you still hate me.”

“Great.” Enjolras stumbled back to his tent, grabbed his sleeping bag, gathered it in his arms as best he could. There was some awkward shifting, some close breathing as they maneuvered around one another and the tent flap, as Enjolras found space, as Grantaire made it.

“Thanks,” Enjolras whispered, when they were both in their sleeping bags, separate, settled.

“Please. No trouble at all.”

Enjolras fell asleep to the sounds of his own heartbeat, too strong, and the easy rhythm of Grantaire's breathing. Outside, wind sighed and shifted through the pines.

 

**Day 17**

“So maybe we should try to find some things we have in common? To talk about?”

Enjolras shifted his pack so it rested more comfortably on his shoulders. They’d gotten an early start and he was sleepy, still, but shockingly not cranky. The world felt solid beneath his feet this morning, on the rocky trail up the Golden Staircase. He was prepared, having trained, for the elevation change ahead. The sky was cloudless and it wasn’t hot, yet, the sun still hanging low. He felt centered.

“We’re going up about 4100 feet today, Grantaire,” he said. “I’m not sure we’re going to want to do much talking.”

“Better get it all in now, then, before we really start climbing.”

Enjolras rolled his eyes. “We’ll just wind up arguing.”

“Maybe not. Look. How about – what books do you like. Novels, I mean, not political treatises or really long bills or whatever other nerd shit you read.”

Harsh, but, well. Fair. “Um. That’s kind of tough, actually. I’ve never been huge on fiction. I like James Baldwin’s work, a lot, and I’ve read his novels. Though also his essays, obviously. Colette, too, I’ve read some Colette I really enjoyed.”

“See! This is going great already. I love James Baldwin and Colette. Both.”

“Huh.” Enjolras pushed his hair back. It was getting a little long, now, falling forward into his face. Maybe he’d try cutting it later, with his pocketknife. “Okay, that’s a start. I like the social dystopias, Orwell, Atwood.”

“Any Vonnegut?”

Enjolras made a face. “Not really. Too flippant and irreverent. I imagine you eat that shit up.”

“I would have to say that that is accurate, yes.”

And it was remarkable, really – they didn’t fight. Not this time. They talked like this, measured, even. They talked about things they liked. They talked about authors and they talked about art, and it had been a strangely long time since Enjolras had talked about art, and he remembered, now, that he liked it.

And when they had to stop talking, breathing too heavily to waste air on words, it stayed with him, their conversation, and occupied his thoughts. They kept on up the staircase, ascending into the sky.

“It’s leveling out.” At last, relief. “Oh, thank god it’s leveling out. I’m dying here.”

“There’s a lake up ahead. Let’s – let’s get up there, we can purify some water and take a break.”

Enjolras was pretty sure he’d never been happier to see anything than he was to see Lower Palisade Lake, green and blue against grey stone, brown sand. He sat by the bank, breathing hard. “We still have a long ways up to go.”

“Be quiet and let me have this,” Grantaire said. He was stretched out on a rock, arms above his head, shirt riding up to expose the skin of his stomach. He looked like a cat in the sun. Enjolras watched as he rolled over onto his belly, pushed himself up to his feet, and tugged his shirt up over his head.

“Uh, what.” The words fell from his lips completely unexcused, completely without permission.

“I’m going for a swim,” Grantaire said, turning to him with a smile. “Join me?”

“Um.” Enjolras blinked. Grantaire had another tattoo besides the flowers on the back of his neck – a grape vine on his side. He was stepping out of his pants. Enjolras remembered looking at him in the rain, remembered finding him attractive. “I think I’ll stay here for now. Don’t wanna get wet before the climb.”

“Suit yourself,” Grantaire shrugged, and, still in his boxers, plunged into the crystal water.

Enjolras had to admit, it did look good. Looked like it felt good, he meant. For Grantaire. Not because of Grantaire. Not that Grantaire looked good.

He emerged from the water like Mister fuckin Darcy. Please, universe, Enjolras thought, please just give me a break.

“Come on,” Grantaire said, dripping, wet hair slicked back. He was grinning in Enjolras’ direction. “It feels great, come in.”

He went in. Whatever. It was getting hotter out, and he was sweating, and the water looked nice. Sue him. He went in and it felt amazing, cool, refreshing, washing away dust and perspiration, washing away everything. Enjolras submerged himself, and his hair fanned out around his head, and everything was suspended, frozen, paused. Afloat in time.

When he emerged he was immediately splashed, and, well, probably should’ve seen that coming.

“I’m so sorry. I couldn't resist.”

“Oh, I understand,” Enjolras said, and with both hands shoved water back in his direction, and they were splashing each other like teenagers at the town pool, laughing, and there was no one to see and judge them, and there was no one to ask what exactly was going on between them, anyway, and didn’t they hate each other? And Enjolras didn’t care, and the mountains broke the skyline so effortlessly.

“Truce, truce!” Grantaire yelled, hands up, and Enjolras ceased and desisted. They were laughing, still, and Enjolras discovered they were closer, physically, than he’d thought.

“Hi,” he said, because that was a totally not absurd thing to say in this moment.

“Hey,” Grantaire said back. A drop of water rolled down the side of his face, and Enjolras felt very, very vulnerable, then: he was almost naked, here, with this almost-stranger, on a mountain under an open sky. And the almost-stranger was looking at him with his grey-green eyes, face inscrutable, no map, no trail markers.

The water lapped around them but they were so quiet they were barely breathing. Enjolras was aware of every inch of his skin, every muscle in his body. He looked at Grantaire. He remembered looking at him in the rain. How beautiful he’d been, then. Wet hair, wild eyes. How beautiful he was now.

“Better get back to that climb, then,” he said immediately after this thought, almost tripping over the words they came out so fast. And then he was paddling back towards the shore, thinking, help me, help me, why am I such a mess, why on god's green earth am I attracted to someone like Grantaire.

 

**Day 18**

“ _Nowhere will you see the majestic operations of nature more clearly revealed beside the frailest, most gentle and peaceful things. Nearly all the park is a profound solitude. Yet it is full of charming company, full of God’s thoughts, a place of peace and safety amid the most exalted grandeur and eager enthusiastic action, a new song, a place of beginnings abounding in first lessons on life, mountain-building, eternal, invincible, unbreakable order; with sermons in stones, storms, trees, flowers, and animals brimful of humanity. During the last glacial period, just past, the former features of the range were rubbed off as a chalk sketch from a blackboard, and a new beginning was made. Hence the wonderful clearness and freshness of the rocky pages._ ”

“I like that,” Enjolras said, taking a bite of his last apple, stepping over a rock on the trail. They were heading down from Pinchot Pass. “A place of beginnings.”

“I have to admit,” Grantaire said from behind him, “It would break my heart to see capitalists tear this place apart for oil or lumber or whatever else they thought they could get out of it. I’m glad. That the government’s protecting it, I mean.”

Enjolras stopped, turned, hope flickering up like a match in his chest. “You what?”

Grantaire rolled his eyes, but he was smiling. “Yes, yes, I’ve changed my mind, I agree with you on something political, hooray, tell everyone.”

“If only there were anyone to tell.” Enjolras felt gleeful. He contained it. He bit his lip to keep from smiling too hard. “I knew you’d come around, you know.”

“Right, otherwise why would you have put in all that effort.”

Enjolras could kiss him. Fuck. No, Enjolras, stop thinking that shit! Don’t make a mess! Save yourself! But he looked so kissable, looking up at him, curly hair blowing forward in the breeze. There was no one around, no one for miles. He could kiss him right here, could slip the backpack off his back, could pull his shirt up over his head, could tug his pants down to his knees and-

“Well, don’t make a big deal out of it, just thought I’d let you know.” Grantaire kept going.

Enjolras could kill Combeferre, and all the rest of them, for doing this to him, for making his body burn like this. God save them all when he made it to Mount Whitney.

 

**Day 19**

It couldn’t last.

Of course it couldn’t last. In Onion Valley they stopped to resupply food and it all fell apart, and it wasn’t much of a surprise, was it? He’d hated Grantaire, what, three days ago? Less? He’d expected that to change overnight?

“I’m just saying, under a purely socialist system, we probably wouldn’t have these services out here. The state wouldn’t be able to extend itself enough to bring resources to low traffic, unpopulated regions.”

“You _completely_ misunderstand the aims of the socialist state.”

It continued; it followed them from the store, over the Kearsarge Pass, into those crisp, clean slate mountains Muir was going on about, up over the wonderful clearness and freshness of those rocky pages. It was like a stormcloud, though the sky was mostly clear, though the breeze was gentle, though the marmots seemed happy enough, and the songbirds, and the deer, carrying on without them.

And wouldn’t that be nice, when they could carry on without each other, Enjolras thought. When he’d be free of this burden, this person who wouldn’t stop pushing him, challenging everything political he said. They had books in common, fine, and art, and some music, they’d discovered, and films, and they had the same hobbies, and the same favorite places in Seattle, and they were of a similar temperament, weren’t they, passionate and stubborn?

But politics was in his bones. It was who he was. And Grantaire was impossible. Impossibly bull-headed, impossibly contrary, impossibly wrong about all – well, most things. Impossibly lovely, suddenly, to look at, to share a tent with, which they’d been doing in the nights since, for warmth, Enjolras told himself, for safety. Impossibly soft-looking lips.

“You just don’t care,” Enjolras snarled, spinning around to face him. “That’s what it comes down to, Grantaire, all these arguments we’ve been having, it comes down to me caring and you not giving a shit. You critique things without offering real alternatives. You act like you have beliefs, some kind of libertarian bullshit, but like you said, right, you’re a nihilist first. You don’t think any of this has meaning. You’re not-”

“You haven’t been listening.” Grantaire’s face was desperate, angry, brow furrowed in frustration, eyes flashing. God, he was hot. He was so fucking hot. “This is what I was trying to tell you, when I was asking why you argue with me, why you waste the energy. Doesn’t make sense to waste the energy unless you give a shit, right, that’s what I kept saying! So why do you think I argue?”

“To play devil’s advocate,” Enjolras said, throwing his hands in the air. Ignoring the lust gathering low in his stomach. “To be an asshole. That’s all you’ve shown me.”

Grantaire’s face was in shadow. They’d descended into Vidette Meadow, where pines rose high from mossy earth. The world was bursts of green, and Grantaire’s eyes, and white-hot anger mixed with that loathsome wanting burning in Enjolras’ veins.

“Enjolras, I care. I care too much.” A lock of hair escaped from Grantaire’s messy bun. Even now, Enjolras’ fingers itched to tuck it back. Shit. “I care so much I don’t know how to – I just don’t know how to handle it, okay, and I’m depressed a lot of the time and I’m just, I’m such a mess, alright? And you – I don’t – I only argue with you so much because you make it so much worse, Enjolras, from the moment I met you, and you started talking about, I don’t know, conservation, or something, with so much conviction, I-“ He paused, he licked his lips. “You made me want to believe in things. You make me want to care, all the time. So I get, I get angry, I get defensive, I try to protect myself from what happens every time I’ve ever given a damn. With things like – with a lot of things, but especially with things like government, Enjolras, you just can’t win, so it’s better to try to figure things out on your own, make your own solution, your own way. That’s all. But you-“

Enjolras' head was spinning. He felt like maybe he should stop him, but he didn’t know what to say. He didn’t know what he wanted to say. Dryness was gathering in his throat. The wanting was still burning, burning, burning in his bones, eating away at his skin.

“You make me want to believe change can actually happen, so. Yeah, I fight that. Because as much as I want to believe it I know I shouldn’t, I know I can’t. And it doesn’t help, y’know, that you’re so – goddamned, beautiful, like holy, shit it’s not fair, it’s just not fucking fair.”

Uh. What?

“And look. Look over there.” He pointed, and Enjolras looked. It was Vidette Peak, rising majestic through a clearing in the trees, a perfect point, a jagged tooth tearing the clouds. It was purple and blue and the sky was blue and white, and the air was in motion, and a woodpecker drilled, somewhere, into a tree trunk.

“You act like human politics are everything, but. You can’t tell me you never feel small. You can’t tell me you can look at that mountain and not feel small, and I think maybe sometimes you need reminding of that, because you’re keyed up, Enjolras, you’re ready to jump on the first person who has a different idea than you, and I know it doesn’t make sense to pander to the other side or try to see things their way when their beliefs are opposed to your existence but that’s not me, Enjolras, I’m not the enemy, I’m in your camp, and if you can’t talk to me, well, where’s your revolution? So maybe that’s my purpose, maybe I’m here to tell you how small we are. And maybe you’re here to remind me that small things matter.” He took a breath. He wrung his hands. “I rambled a lot just now, so, please say something, okay.”

Enjolras looked at him, his angry eyes, his soft lips. His brain completely betrayed him, as it always seemed to do around Grantaire, and all it told his mouth to say was: “What was that you said about me, ah, I’m beautiful?”

Grantaire moaned and buried his face in his hands. “Are you serious?” He said, looking at Enjolras desperately again, “God, Enjolras, that was the least important part, sure, you’re beautiful, you have to know that, and I have this – this – this stupid, massive, crush on you, so what, you’re-“

It was too much. In the shadow of Vidette Peak Enjolras kissed him on the mouth, stopping him short.

“Oh,” Grantaire squeaked.

“Yes,” Enjolras said, because it was all he could think to say, and kissed him again. This time Grantaire sighed into his lips and pitched forward, and his body melted into his, and it felt so much - god, _so_ much better to kiss him than it did to argue with him. But passion was there, of the same kind, and maybe it had just been sexual tension all along? Probably not. Enjolras wouldn’t fool himself. There would be arguments to come.

They could wait. They could wait, because right now he was _kissing Grantaire._ Right now the burning was intensifying, fuck, right now he was pushing Grantaire’s backpack off his shoulders, and Grantaire had the same idea, and his mouth was hot on his, and Grantaire’s hands were toying with the hem of his shirt, and -

“God, you are too good for me." Grantaire's face was flushed, his pupils dilated. 

“So absurd I don’t even know how to respond to it,” Enjolras said as his shirt was coming up over his head. Grantaire moved his lips to Enj’s chest, pressed searing kisses along his collarbone. 

“We probably shouldn’t fuck on this trail, right,” he breathed against Enjolras' neck.

“We are absolutely,” Enjolras said, catching Grantaire’s lower lip between his teeth, “Without a doubt. Going to fuck on this trail.”

Grantaire whimpered, and kissed him like he was starving, and then, thank god, there was no more talking.

This next a blur: they fell to meet the earth, or maybe the earth rose to meet them. No one to see but the mountain, the birds, the trees. Enjolras pinned Grantaire to the forest floor. Enjolras teased Grantaire’s mouth open with his tongue, Enjolras rolled his hips forward into Grantaire’s. Grantaire's lips parted in a gasp that reverberated in Enj's head, settled in his ribcage. The forest spun around them, flashes of green.

They shed their boots, their socks, a shirt, a belt. They touched each other with eager hands. Enjolras breathed Grantaire’s name. The pine trees swayed in the wind and it felt like the earth was shifting, making way for them, pulling them under. 

They got naked, somehow, in a jumble of limbs, tangling and untangling, desperate not to stop touching, not to stop this. Desperate for skin on skin. Enjolras wished they’d done this earlier, one of their nights in the tent, up against a rock on the lakeside at Lower Palisade Lake.

“Oh god,” Enjolras moaned, as their bodies aligned, as they found bare friction at last. “Grantaire. I want to be inside you.”

“Fuck.”

“I don’t have any lube or anything, do you?”

“Tried to pack light,” Grantaire groaned, “Really fucking regretting it.”

Enjolras laughed, at that, as much as he could with what little breath he had in his lungs. “Later,” he said, kissing down Grantaire’s neck, and he took them both in his hand.

“ _Shit_ ,” Grantaire mumbled eloquently, eyes closing as Enjolras moved his fingers up and back down, as Enjolras slid a thumb over the head of his cock. Enjolras looked at him, dappled sunlight across his skin.

“Can you- could you use your mouth,” Grantaire asked, half-lidded, breath coming heavy. “It’s okay if you don’t want to, I just-“

Enjolras had him in his mouth before Grantaire could form his next word, and Grantaire’s hips were rising off the forest floor, Enjolras' fingers were digging into his thighs. Enjolras wanted to swallow him whole; Enjolras wanted him, wanted him, wanted him, every inch, every piece, never thought he could ever want this person this much, so suddenly. But Grantaire was heavy on his tongue and he was so hard he was aching and the trail was spinning, spinning, spinning.

"Don't stop," Grantaire whispered, cording his fingers through Enjolras' hair, as if Enjolras had any intention of stopping. As if Enjolras could ever, ever have dreamed of stopping when Grantaire felt this good, when he'd wanted this so long, so badly.

Grantaire came without warning, shuddering, gasping, into Enjolras’ mouth. And without any break he spat in his palms and took Enj in his hands, and god, those _hands_ , and Enj had been close already and was close behind, spilling his cum on the forest floor.

There was a long moment of silence, birds chirping, heavy breathing. Enjolras' chest rose and fell.

“Wow.” Grantaire said at last. Beautiful, stubborn, stupid Grantaire, sitting up, wrapping his arms around his knees. “That was.”

Enjolras nodded, breathing still shaky. He lay down, tried to steady himself. The world was still spinning. “Yeah, it. It definitely was.”

“So um. Did it." Grantaire bit his lip. "Did it mean – anything? I mean. Do you-“

“Have a crush on you too?” Enjolras looked up at Grantaire from where he lay in the moss, in the partial sunlight, under the pine trees, in the shadow of the mountain. His stomach tied into knots. "Honestly," he said, and his eyes flicked away, towards the trees. He couldn't look Grantaire in the eye. "I - I don't know. I'm kind of terrible at, at all this." His thoughts were still reeling, still dizzy. Had he really just done that? Had he really just been brave enough, had he really just acted on desire without thought? Who was he?

"Ah." Grantaire's face was inscrutable again. "Okay. That's-"

"You make me furious," Enjolras interrupted. Breathing was getting easier, his heartrate slowing. "I still think you're wrong about pretty much all of the things we've argued over. And I'm never going to just be okay, with libertarianism, or nihilism. Your philosophies are pretty much antithetical to who I am as a person."

"So you still hate me. Got it. Cool." Grantaire's face was like an open book, now, all of a sudden. Heartbreak written in every line. "Sounds about right. Sorry I even-"

"No, Grantaire, I." Enjolras breathed out. Why was he so bad at this? He sat up. "What I'm trying to say is, you were right, when you pointed out that I must care what you think. I do care. I care because I think you're smart, and I think you care, too, and I want you to care, because you're passionate, like me, even if you pretend you're not. And that passion could do so much good. And obviously, uh, I'm. Well. _Very_ attracted to you, and you're funny, and sincere when you want to be. I like talking to you, about whatever. You make me want to take you to museums, and like, out for coffee, maybe, and I don't usually feel that way. About people. And you're right, too, that sometimes I need to um. Take care of myself, and not let myself get so overwhelmed." He blinked.

Oh.

"Grantaire," he said, and he was dumbstruck. "I think I have a crush on you."

Grantaire breathed out. “Oh."

"Yeah."

"Yeah." Grantaire was grinning, now, and his face was flushed some beautiful shade of pink, and Enjolras felt as giddy as he looked. "So um. Okay. That's - that's fucking - that's good. That's." He paused. He laughed, helplessly. "I didn't expect to get this far. Where do we go from here?"

Enjolras leaned towards Grantaire. "Mount Whitney," he said, and kissed him, lingering on the softness of his lips, on the way he moved, slightly, forward, buried a hand in Enjolras’ hair. His heart felt light, his heart felt open. He let the kiss deepen. He let himself go. He listened, all sweetness, to the wind, the birds, the –

Wait.

Enjolras broke away. “Shhhh, shh shh shh. Do you hear that?”

They were silent for a moment and there it was, unmistakable – human whistling. From behind them on the trail.

“Oh shit!”

Grantaire jumped up and grabbed his clothes, and Enjolras laughed and Grantaire laughed and they scrambled, tripping over each other, to get dressed.

 --

“ _The sun shines not on us but in us. The rivers flow not past, but through us. Thrilling, tingling, vibrating every fiber and cell of the substance of our bodies, making them glide and sing. The trees wave and the flowers bloom in our bodies as well as our souls, and every bird song, wind song, and tremendous storm song of the rocks in the heart of the mountains is our song, our very own, and sings our love._ ”

 

**Day 20**

They met up with the group again at Guitar Lake, 4.7 miles from and 3,028 ft below the Mount Whitney summit.

“You crazy bastards!” Courfeyrac ran to greet them, threw his arms around Enjolras’ neck. “Oh, you had me worried half to death, I thought you’d died out there.”

“You’re somehow acting like it wasn’t _you_ who abandoned _us_ in the middle of nowhere.”

“Abandoned is a very strong word.”

“Yeah, but I think it’s an accurate word, though.”

“In all honesty,” Combeferre said, while Bossuet, Joly and Musichetta converged on Grantaire, “We thought you’d catch up with us within a day at the most. We weren’t going particularly fast – did you take a different route?”

They settled into the camp the group had already pitched, the fire already blazing. The sun sunk behind the mountains. Enjolras and Combeferre compared maps, and Grantaire added their tent to the line, and slowly everyone drifted towards the fire, coming together like magnets, like moths to the flame. Grantaire settled into place next to Enjolras, gaze tentative, searching. Enjolras took his hand.

“Last night,” Musichetta said sadly, and Bossuet put an arm around her, and they all stared quietly into the fire, listening to the crackle, feeling the warmth of it, the warmth of being amongst friends, amongst family.

“Got any good Muir for us, Combeferre, to see us off?”

“I’ve used up my memory banks,” Combeferre admitted, smiling. “But Grantaire, I think, has the book now. Find anything useful, Grantaire?”

Grantaire turned to tug the book from the front pocket of his pack behind him.

“ _The battle we have fought,_ ” he read, “ _and are still fighting, for the forests, is a part of the eternal conflict between right and wrong, and we cannot expect to see the end of it. I trust, however, that our Club will not weary in this forest well-doing. The fight for the Yosemite Park and other forest parks and reserves is by no means over; nor would the fighting cease, however much the boundaries were contracted. Every good thing, great and small, needs defense._ ”

Enjolras took his hand again and squeezed it tight, the swelling feeling in his chest turning to aching, turning to something like love. Not there yet, but. Maybe someday in the not-so-distant future. Maybe in Seattle. Grantaire smiled, and Enj's heart felt split open.

“Or,” Grantaire added, “To forego politics, just this once, for something else, here's another: _Between every two pines is a doorway to a new world._ ” 

**Day 21**

At the summit of Mount Whitney Enjolras kissed Grantaire, and it tasted like 210.4 miles, and beginnings, and clean mountain air.

**Author's Note:**

> thank you for reading this, I absolutely love you.
> 
> 1\. if you're feeling like I used the promise of fictional characters having sex to make you read a bunch of john muir, that's exactly what I did
> 
> 2\. if you have hiked this trail and I have made mistakes (I'm sure I have!) please, please feel free to drag me
> 
> 3\. if you liked this, let me know, or better yet follow me on pinterest @jomarches! I am very new to pinterest and I have no followers but I effin love pinterest! please!


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